1 posts from July 9, 2014

July 09, 2014

Conference USA awarded junior catcher Aramis Garcia its Player of the Year honor. Tuesday, Garcia completed a sweet sweep, being named Conference USA's Scholar Athlete of the Year for Baseball. C-USA names one for each sport.

In the spring, Garcia also received the Conference USA Spirit of Service Award and was on the conference's All-Academic baseball team.

ATHLETICS

Here's two different ways to rank athletic programs' on the field/court performances.

The first is the National Association of College Directors of Athletics Director's Cup, which takes into account 20 different sports. It's sort of like The Herald's All-Sports Award we do for high schools, except no greater significance is given to the more promiment sports. It's designed for the broadest-based athletic programs to reach the standings' penthouse.

In that ranking, 2013-14 FIU came in 257th out of 298 schools.

The other way is the CBSSports.com way, in which you consider only the marquee sports -- football, men's and women's basketballs, baseball and the most successful that season among the other sports at the school (for FIU in 2013-14, that probably would be swimming & diving -- second in Conference USA, scoring a few points at the NCAA meet). Heaviest weight given to football, second heaviest to men's basketball. nly schools with FBS football programs were considered.

Looking at things this way, FIU finished tied with Miami of Ohio, Nevada and Temple for 123rd. Or, last.